Exploring the Atmosphere
with Extreme Balloons
Columbia Space Initiative
What is the Columbia Space Initiative?
Workshop Overview
1.
2.
3.
4.
The Ozone Layer
Weather Balloons
The Experiment
Q&A
The Ozone Layer
What is the ozone layer?
●
●
●
A layer of ozone (O3) in the Stratosphere
20 to 30 kilometers (12 to 19 miles) above the Earth
Not very thick - 10ppm (parts per million) compared to 0.3ppm near the
surface
Why is the ozone important to the Earth?
●
●
It’s a very thin layer of gas very high up - why is it important?
It’s important because it absorbs harmful radiation from the sun.
○
○
●
The Ozone layer blocks 98% of UVB, or Ultraviolet-B, radiation from the sun.
The Ozone layer also blocks 100% of UVC radiation.
UVB is harmful to life on Earth.
○
○
○
UVB is linked to skin cancer and cataracts in humans
UVB leads to damage to oceanic life.
UVB also impairs photosynthesis in plants.
The ozone layer is
extremely important
to life on Earth.
What happened to the ozone layer?
●
Beginning in the 1970s, the ozone layer began to be significantly affected by
CFCs.
○
○
●
●
●
CFCs, or Chlorofluorocarbons, were used in aerosol cans.
Chlorine reacts with ozone and destroys it.
By the late 1980s, the ozone layer above the arctic was destroyed by up to 65
percent.
The Montreal Protocol was signed in 1989 to limit the use of CFCs.
It will still take ~50 years for the ozone layer to recover.
The world we avoided
Weather Balloons
What is a weather balloon?
●
●
●
●
●
A weather balloon is a large balloon made to reach high altitudes.
It is often filled with helium or hydrogen.
It can reach 120,000 ft (23 miles, 37 km) or even higher.
The balloon expands to be very large as it rises.
It has a lot of applications:
○
○
○
Weather research: NOAA
Hobbyist: Cameras
Special: Red bull
Weather balloons
Weather balloons
Captured
Gator in space
3:30
The Experiment
(The Scientific Method)
The Question
What are we looking for?
What do we want to know?
How does the amount of UVB
radiation change as we go
higher in altitude?
The Hypothesis
What do we think will
happen?
What is our educated
guess?
IF-THEN statement
The Experiment
Design and plan the
experiment
●
●
●
●
●
●
Materials
Logistics
Independent variable
Dependent variable
Procedure
Data
Analysis
Interpret the data
What does the data mean?
UVB plot
Conclusion
What did we learn?
Do we accept or reject the
hypothesis?
Q&A